To Be Enslaved
by taratron
Summary: Without freedom, nothing matters.


To Be Enslaved  
by Taratron

"You've sunk to a new low, Megatron," said my nemesis, Optimus Primal, and he was not talking about that fool traitor I had finally killed only days ago. No, he meant something else entirely, and thankfully I did not have to endure any more of his idiocies, as Inferno was smart enough to shoot him.

Predacons do not retreat, we strategically outmaneuver. In some cases, yesss, that does include returning to base. We did not return to base after that fool comment, as Primal insisted on another pointless skirmish, at which point I summoned the freakish crab Rampage to deal with Primal. The ape wisely flew away after that.

And without his initial target in mangling proximity, Rampage turned to Inferno. Only a quick two squeezes on the crab's spark-box saved the ant. And even then it was a close call.

Rampage might have cunning, but not intelligence.

"Tuh-Thank you Royalty!" Inferno stammered out, and I merely squeezed the box again. The crab's shrieks of agony were not music to my audios, but close enough.

"Return to base," I ordered, and Inferno was gone at the end of the last syllable. Rampage had yet to move.

I prodded him with my foot. "I said return to base!"

The freakish monster only growled back, a noise which was transformed into a high screech with another constriction on his spark. Only after I eased my grip did he beastmode and wearily head back to base.

A new low, Primal? Really….

And now that I ponder on it, this is hardly a new low, or anything of the sort. Optimus Primal is a fool in many aspects, but he repeatedly delights me in proving his inaccuracies time and time again.

He was not speaking of Dinobot, oh, noooo. He meant the monster Rampage. Otherwise known as Protoform X. A secret sacred immortal spark conceived and constructed by Maximals in the late days of the Great War, after a truce had been made.

And they call Predacons treacherous.

A perfect weapon, a perfect warrior, no doubt, was what they set out to make. A creature with a viable spark that would keep on sparking no matter how firmly death attached on. A creature who would obey his creators, who could undertake vast amounts of pain and still be able to fight.

I imagine the homicidal tendencies were an added bonus. Because Rampage, or X, at that time, would neither obey nor listen to his creators. He was mindless, he was sentient, and according to records he was given a voice weeks after his activation for reasons still unknown. He was never seen as a true live person, only as a weapon.

In that light, I can understand, almost, his rage. Being used by Maximal scientists as a way to insure the Predacons did not get too uppity in war and power. Being locked in cages, used as a thing rather than a sentient person. Being treated as an item. Finally escaping their slavery, and his first action was not to leave Cybertron and its colonies far behind, but to demolish as many lives as he could. Omicron and Rugby, oh, yessss, everyone knows about those two. But there were at least four others.

The Maximal version of population control.

And then he was recaptured. How remains a mystery. His rage pent up, as he was, locked and forced into a formless stasis. The Maximals, showing again their duplicity in nature, decided that destroying him would clash with their pristine and mighty morals. Instead, his pod was sent aboard an exploratory vessel, to be dropped on a sterile world.

Never mind that his very creation clashed against their pure morals of justice and harmony for all. And no world is entirely sterile. Even I, as without science as my slave, know that.

I think they merely wanted him out. Gone from Cybertron would be any evidence that indeed, Maximals could be as cruel, if not more, than Predacons.

And so the protoform ended up here. In the BeastWars. And it was then that I fully learned more about this creature, Maximal High Command's hush project and safety net in the case the truce went bust. Rampage began his life anew, and his own again, on this planet, and his first action was to dismember Tarantulas.

The Maximals went after him, and more fools they to nearly destroy him, to leave him in stasis, and walk away, as though he was dead, and the world safe for another day.

Primus save us from Maximal stupidity. Rampage had survived experiments at the hands of malicious scientists in his early life. I doubt stasis would have slowed him down for long.

The point remains that they left him, they walked away from the problem in the same way they once tried to leave him in solitary. To wash their hands of a murderer they themselves had created and now no longer desired.

And Primal dares to accuse me of sinking to a new level of despicable nature? Granted, my record is far from pristine, but had I created that protoform, he would have been constructed with a destruction system.

Yet look what his spark can endure! Having Energon crystals jabbed into it, which would destroy any other spark, and not only once, but repeatedly, day and time again. The monster feeds from pain, even his own.

And Primal dares accuse me. Perhaps his reflection is giving him problems with where to place the blame now.

Yes, Rampage is mine. His life, whatever else he may have done or might do, belongs to me now. He is my servant, he is my slave, and when he tries to ape (no pun intended) his betters, he learns his place in the world. His creators sought him as a tool, and a tool he shall be. He is too dangerous otherwise.

So yes, Primal, let us leave the monster who cannot die and barely feel pain alive. Let us leave him able to fix himself, and remember who attacked him in the first place. Let him realize that he can easily come after any of us and leave us as Tarantulas was. Or worse. Let us grant him his freedom after all he has done, because to do otherwise would be cruel.

As if his creation and those experiments were not.

As if he is not.

No, Rampage might have had a chance to be normal. Once. Once upon a time, he might have looked at freedom without seeing chances to kill others in terrible ways. He might have been able to be saved, might have ended up as mundane and sane as the next person. But alas, no and not anymore. He was made to be a killer and he has far exceeded his creators' wishes with that.

And that is all he is. He may be sentient, he may be cunning, but he is ruthless and he is a sadistic killer. Yet Primal's Maximals see it fit to leave him at the mercy of the wild, when he himself can overcome even stasis lock?

Again, Maximal stupidity astounds.

So I am the cruel one then. To take this beast's spark and imprison it, to imprison him in the most base but easiest way possible, of course, that makes me the cruel one, the sadistic one, the one who must be stopped. I am the one who must be stopped before I harm another spark.

Do those idiotic Maximals realize that if Rampage were free, if I did not control him, we would all be dead? No words would sway him, no pleas, no whimpers or screams. He lives for those, after all.

Judging from his past record, he would keep us all alive for a time. And slowly we would realize how badly one can want to die. Even the Matrix would not be a promise, as I have read that he used to devour sparks as well. Tasty treats for the soul, I suppose.

So no, of course they don't realize that by holding one spark hostage I am saving everyone else's. Yesss...even those pathetic Maximals. I keep my pet on a short leash, but if he wants Maximals and can catch them, he deserves a treat once in a while. If he earns it. If he remembers who owns him.

And slavery? Slavery might be illegal, it might be corrupt, but at times it is a need and not a want. Would any of these Maximals enjoy having him run loose and free, free to attack whom he wishes and dismember others? Leaving sparks alive for days in the open? This is not what those scientists had planned, I doubt, but this is their net result.

I wonder if it makes them proud. If any of them are alive still, at least.

The point remains that I have sunken by no levels. I never created this monster, I never aided him in his present condition of sadistic massacre, I have never done a thing with X save make him mine. He has belonged to scientists and High Command and, for a brief time, himself. But now he is mine, and he is learning to heel.

Primal will call it whatever he chooses, but had he been thinking at all, he would have done the same. Perhaps not use the protoform as another warrior, but locked him in stasis, conscious, alive. Another form of cruelty that the Maximals would swear is mercy.

A new low? Fine, then, Primal, call it as you see it. Believe that all Maximals have good intentions, that they live for mercy and justice, that they are the heroes of every world, that they did not create such a beast, merely tried to tame it down. Believe as you want, because you will anyway.

So your protoform X is now my Rampage. And you call it injustice, call it slavery, call it malicious and cruel and without mercy. As it suits me, and suits him, then, yes. Because I welcomed him to the BeastWars and warned him not to forget one thing about his life: that it is mine.

And Primal…could you imagine the danger we would all be in….if it was his?

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